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Individualized Instruction | Mastery Learning | Graduation Requirements
Work-Study Program | Interdisciplinary
Humanities Units
Studio
Art | Creative Writing | Applied
Music | Foreign
Language
Individualized Instruction
Much
of our instruction is one-to-one. Students follow an individually
planned study program in all core academic subjects: they complete reading,
writing, math, science, computer science, foreign language, history and
other assignments at their own pace.
Our individualized instruction makes it possible for students to accomplish more in 3 1/2 hours than in a full day of conventional school. Students attend either a morning or an afternoon session-the remainder of the day is spent in the workplace. Students are required to work at least 150 hours per semester in a paid or volunteer job. The heart of our instructional program is the strong advisor/advisee relationship between faculty and students. Faculty advisors meet with their advisees daily and help them plan each week's work. Students' progress towards graduation is monitored on a continual basis, and reports are sent to parents weekly.
Mastery Learning
At BFA, we teach a "mastery" curriculum: students work on a subject until they demonstrate mastery of it, which to us is indicated by a grade of 90% or better on each and every assignment. Although most BFA students complete their coursework on a timeframe similar to that in conventional schools, our mastery curriculum allows us to accommodate students who may need more time on a particular subject or who want to speed up their progress toward graduation.
In the conventional school system, teachers can't stop everything to
let one student catch up, nor can they give students who want additional
challenges the opportunity to do advanced work. America's standard Carnegie-unit
based system is keyed to time spent in class, and time truly waits for
no one.
We use a different approach to instruction that does not place a premium on time in class. We base our unit of instruction on mastery of school subjects, rather than on the time spent on them. In mastery learning, students must demonstrate knowledge of the subject to be learned before credit is given. We believe that mastery learning provides the greatest opportunity for students who are eager learners or who need to catch up, or in many cases, to accelerate their high school programs.
Mastery learning requires that there is some pre-determined, understood and agreed-upon level of knowledge or skill to be attained, and gaining this mastery is the goal of student effort. At BFA, we have translated conventional Carnegie units into mastery terms for all subjects and college prep work.
The great advantage of a mastery approach is that, as teachers, we start by finding out what our students know, then help them learn the things they will need to know in order to demonstrate mastery. Using a mastery approach also provides flexibility for accommodating instruction to individual learning styles, needs and interests.
At BFA, our goal is to make students the masters of their lives and of their learning.
